The Newlyweds' First Christmas

The Newlyweds' First Christmas For couples being married this year, one thing that they will have to look forward to is their first Christmas spent together as husband and wife. It can be a magical time to spend with family and friends. Your first Christmas is also a wonderful time to establish traditions that you will celebrate for the rest of your life.

The holidays can be a very busy time. For newlyweds, they can also be a stressful time. You have to decide: do we spend the day with my family or yours? When the parents of each person are demanding their presence around the holiday table, it is easy to feel torn. Many couples handle this by alternating holidays. They spend Thanksgiving with one family, then Christmas with the other. The following year, they can switch where they go for each holiday. This is one of those solutions that may not entirely please anybody, but it is often the most equitable. If your families live far away, or if it seems impossible to go to just one of them for Christmas, the newlyweds might decide that they are better off staying home. Perhaps you could extend an invitation to both sets of parents to join you to start a new holiday tradition. If they decline, well, at least the effort was made. It is always very exciting to get your first Christmas tree together. If possible, make the event extra memorable by going to a farm and cutting it yourself. Traipsing through the snowy woods together searching for that perfect tree is a lot of fun. Afterwards, you can enjoy a cozy mug of cocoa snuggled in front of a crackling fireplace. Decorating the Christmas tree is equally fun. Sometimes the bride or groom will have sentimental ornaments from their childhood that they want to hang, but often a couple does not have any of their own decorations. You can create a great homey tree without spending a lot of money if you make your own ornaments out of natural materials. Put on a classic Christmas movie, and watch it while stringing popcorn or cranberries. You can spraypaint pinecones a soft gold for terrific looking decorations that will last through the years. Other great natural materials you can try include orange slices (which look beautiful with white lights twinkling behind them) and star-shaped gingerbread cookies. Every new husband or wife wants to make sure that their first holiday together will be one that they will always remember fondly. One way to do that is with a very special gift. The man might consider giving his new wife a handmade piece of jewelry to complete the set she wore for their wedding day. A fun way to present it is to hang it from the tree on Christmas morning. Even if it just the two of you, be sure to have a real holiday dinner with all of the trimmings. It is an important ritual to establish. The meal will feel even more festive if you both dress up for it. Depending on your lifestyle, you could choose to go really fancy, with a beautiful dress and high heels. It is also a great excuse to pull out your handmade wedding jewelry. For more casual couples, dressing up might mean a festive sweater and a nice pair of wool pants. Just don't spend the whole day in your pajamas - that is not romantic. Your first Christmas together will be one of the occasions where you get to decide what traditions from your childhood to keep and pass down to future generations. It is also a wonderful time for newlyweds to establish the traditions that will be important in their own little family. The first Christmas after the wedding is a joyous time - be sure to enjoy it to its fullest. The Newlyweds' First Christmas

Have an Office Cookie Exchange for Holiday Fun!

Have an Office Cookie Exchange for Holiday Fun! If you and your family love having (or giving) a variety of home-baked cookies for the holidays, but you just don't have the time or energy this year, here's the solution: a holiday cookie exchange!

You can bake just one large batch of your favorite holiday cookies, take them to the cookie exchange, and come home with several different kinds of freshly baked cookies! You'll be the family hero, with minimum effort! Cookie exchanges can be done with friends and neighbors at home parties, or with co-workers at the office. Since the focus of this article is saving time and energy, we'll discuss the office version. Hey, you won't have to spend time cleaning up the house before and after the exchange! Here's how to have a cookie exchange at work: 1. Pick a date. Plan ahead so you can give people plenty of advance notice... at least two weeks. 2. Reserve a conference room or other area for the exchange. Book it for an hour. You're probably safest to plan it for the lunch hour, when your fellow employees will be free to have some non-work-related fun. 3. Invite people to participate. Be careful how you do this at work. Some companies frown on sending personal emails or using the copier for unofficial fliers. Do what's acceptable where you work. You'll want a minimum of six people to make the exchange worthwhile, but less than ten so the amount of baking everyone will have to do is manageable. Explain in your invitation that everyone will need to bake a dozen cookies per participant. So if eight people sign up for the exchange, everyone will need to bring at least eight dozen cookies (extras for sample tasting are encouraged!). Emphasize that family favorites or traditional cookie recipes are preferred, so there will be less chance of two or more people bringing the same type of cookies. Also ask them to bring copies of their cookie recipe for sharing. This is not only a great way for everyone to obtain new cookie recipes, it's a safety mechanism for people with food allergies. They can review the recipe before trying the cookies. 4. Ask everyone you invite to RSVP at least a week prior to the exchange and specify the type of cookie they'll bring. 5. Share the RSVP information with all participants, so everyone will know how many cookies to bake and bring (and how many copies of their cookie recipe). Ask everyone to bring their cookies already counted out, one dozen cookies per participant, packaged in sealable plastic bags (or other containers they don't mind giving away). If eight participants, they'll bring eight bags containing one dozen cookies each. 6. At the exchange (in a decorated room if you're ambitious), it'll be nice to provide coffee or water, and encourage people to sample the cookies. That way you can all rave about each others' culinary skills and have fun swapping stories about baking adventures, cookie recipe development, or the biggest nuts in the company. Relax for a while, have a good time, and take home some new and delicious goodies for the family! For some great cookie recipes for cookie exchanges, visit www.Cookie-Crazy.com. Have an Office Cookie Exchange for Holiday Fun!